DENVER – A different contractor than the one used during August’s Gold King Mine spill was involved with a water-contamination incident near Crested Butte last week.
HDR Engineering Inc. has become the second contractor in recent months to have problems with mine restoration work after being tapped by the Environmental Protection Agency for a mine project.
Environmental Restoration LLC was the first contractor to have a problem, when on Aug. 5 an error during excavation at the Gold King Mine near Silverton resulted in an estimated 3 million gallons of orange mining sludge flowing into the Animas River.
The second incident, which occurred on Oct. 6 at Standard Mine near Crested Butte, sent about 600 gallons of contaminated water from a holding pond at the mine into Elk Creek.
HDR Engineering served as the primary contractor. HDR subcontracted to Harrison Western, which then subcontracted to Southwestern Systems Inc. for the vacuum truck operations.
A vacuum truck pumping water from the holding pond accidentally dipped into gray-colored sediment, which led to the discharge into Elk Creek.
The material released into the creek contained a mixture of pH-neutral pulverized rock slurry and water from the mine. Officials do not believe there was any contamination to drinking water or the creek as a result of the incident.
The EPA originally reported that the spill at the Superfund site could have been as high as 2,000 gallons of contaminated water. But the agency has since revised its estimate to between 500 and 600 gallons.
pmarcus@durangoherald.com